What is a website and why is it considered as business essential in today’s digital age? A website is the virtual face of your brand and the place where potential customers go to learn more about your products and services. However, creating a website can be a daunting task, and it’s essential to consider several factors before getting started. Here are seven things to keep in mind before making a website for your business.

1. Determine your goals:

Before you start creating a website, you need to determine what you want to achieve with it. Do you want to increase brand awareness, generate leads, or sell products online? Knowing your goals will help you create a website that meets your specific needs.

2. Know your target audience:

It’s crucial to understand your target audience to create a website that resonates with them. Consider their age, gender, interests, and online behavior to create a website that speaks directly to them.

3. Choose the right platform:

There are many website platforms available, including WordPress, Wix, and Shopify. Choose a platform that aligns with your goals, budget, and technical expertise.

4. Create a user-friendly design:

Your website should be easy to navigate, with a clear structure and user-friendly interface. Consider the user experience when designing your website and ensure that it’s visually appealing and easy to use.

5. Optimize for search engines:

SEO is essential to ensure that your website appears in search engine results. Research keywords relevant to your business and incorporate them into your website’s content.

6. Develop engaging content:

Your website’s content should be engaging and informative, providing value to your visitors. Use clear and concise language and include visuals to make your content more engaging.

7. Ensure mobile compatibility:

More and more people are using their mobile devices to browse the web. Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly, with a responsive design that adapts to different screen sizes.

In conclusion, creating a website for your business can be a game-changer, but it’s important to consider several factors before getting started. Determine your goals, know your audience, choose the right platform, create a user-friendly design, optimize for search engines, develop engaging content, and ensure mobile compatibility to create a website that meets your business’s needs.

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Email is a powerful tool for communication. It is a primary point of contact with customers, prospects, and partners. It has been an essential part of the business world since its inception in the early 1970s. In fact, it’s the most popular form of communication for businesses.

In this section, we will be discussing how important it is to have a company email address and why it should be your first choice when creating an email account.

The different types of emails include marketing emails, transactional emails, and sales emails. Marketing emails are usually short and to the point, while sales emails are longer and more detailed. Transactional emails are shorter than both marketing and sales but still have a place in your email strategy since they help you keep in touch with your customers on a regular basis.

Every business needs to have a well-thought-out email strategy that includes segmentation, personalization, and timing. There are many use cases for email marketing like customer retention, lead generation, and sales funnels therefore is it important to explore this medium by getting your business a dedicated company email.

2. Professional in Branding Generates more Sales

With a company email address, you can also make sure the contact information is professional and addresses any potential clients to your business. Having your own domain name for with your business or company name will allow you to build trust and in generally get higher potential in sales.

When you have your own company email in your website, business card, store sign and other ad placements, this sends a signal to your customers that you are serious about your reputation and branding. A business that have its own website and company email address often closes more deals than companies that use generic and free domains from Gmail, Yahoo, etc.

3. Separate your Business from your Personal Emails

One common mistake of businesses starting up is the usage of their personal emails. Similar to privacy and administrative methods used in social media, it’s important that you draw a line from your personal accounts and business accounts. This is to avoid having conflicts received from your business or personal life in order to not affect and drag down both sides.

4. Consider the Emails to be Received

When creating an email account, it is important to consider the amount of spam that will be sent to your inbox. By having a company email address, you can create a filter that categorizes any spam as junk and deletes it as soon as it arrives. Your business email will definitely be exposed to the public in order to get customers, therefore this will be more susceptible to spam emails which is why you should not use your personal email as mentioned in the previous section.

5. How much does it Cost to have a Business Email?

There are two things you need to get in order to have your business email. The first component is the domain name and the other is the email hosting provider.

Domain Names

You should register your domain name as soon as you know what it will be. You can use the Whois service to find out if the domain name is available for registration.

This will be the name of your business which can be used or represent your brand in the world wide web. This will be the www.BusinessName.com for websites or sales@BusinessName.com for emails. They usually cost around Php 800 (Usd 15) which will last for a whole year. When buying domain names, you would have to register your personal details, therefore we highly recommend you to get the privacy addon for a very small fee. DatastiQ offers Domain Registration service at a friendlier price. You can click here to check if your business name is available.

Hosting Service

Another required component is the hosting service for your business email. You can get this for free or for a dedicated email hosting service. Some hosting companies provide this for free when you subscribe to their web hosting services like the Starter & Entrepreneur Plans of DatastiQ. Do take note however that the space for your cPanel email will share the same capacity of your website.

Should you expect to use your business email for higher productivity and dedicated capacity, you can also check our Professional Email Hosting Services for as low as Php 150 (Usd 3) per month per user. Compared to other premium plans, this is the cheapest email hosting for your business. Before you can get a dedicated email hosting, you must have already registered and have your domain name.

If you already have a web hosting service and are using cPanel, you can immediately use the free email service. You can check with your provider if they are offering this as some other platforms do not provide this. On the other hand, if you do not have or not yet planning to have a website, you can register a domain first then get a professional email hosting for your company email.

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Whether you are at home alone, working at home or home-schooled, prolonged isolation can take its toll on mental health. You may experience increased stress, anxiety and less productive this Pandemic.  This may affect your emotional, psychological, and social well-being, and it is very challenging because it affects the things that you love to do, where you want to be and who you want to be as well.

It is important to take care of yourself and get the most from life. Below are the 5 practical ways to look after your mental health during these difficult times.

1. Talk it out. Talk about your feelings.

It’s always better to talk about what you feel rather than keeping it just to yourself.  People living with preexisting mental health conditions may find it hard to deal and cope with the effects of this Pandemic.  We know that the situation we are in right now is very stressful to everyone. It is normal that we feel scared, anxious and worried of what will happen next and what will this virus may bring to the next weeks and months, but it is also important that we know how to take care of ourselves.

If you are living alone, you can still stay connected with your family, friends and loved ones through facetime, chat, call and other social media networks and it is better that way at least you can be both safe and away from any harm. By talking to them, it lessens your anxiety and it can help you stay in good mental health and deal with times you feel troubled. If things are getting too much for you and you feel you can’t cope, ask for help or try to reach out. There are a lot of people who may be able to offer practical help or a listening ear. Always know that no matter where you are or what you are going through, you don’t have to go through it alone.  

2. Keeping active while staying put.

One way to stay physically and mentally healthy is to exercise. Even just at home, you can still exercise every day or even just twice or thrice a week depending on your capabilities. Instead of going out and heading to the gym, you can just download exercise application tutorials and you can also watch simple and easy videos on YouTube as your guide. With that, you are not just staying physically fit but you are also being productive and it keeps your brain and your other vital organs healthy.

It is important that you eat healthy food to boost your immune system and maintain a healthy weight. You should also get plenty of sleep. Getting an adequate sleep is a good thing because it is also a way to spare yourself from anything that will cause you to self-destruct further.  

3. Avoid watching news or anything that will stress you out.

Some of us are watching news or checking our social media feeds every day because we want to be informed of the latest news or updates and every detail of what is going on to make ourselves calm and to reduce our anxiety about this pandemic. However, social media can be helpful sometimes but sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram amplify the most extreme voices and some people are using it to spread false information which is very alarming because it increases other people’s anxiety.

If you find yourself growing more anxious reading negative material, put down your phone or step away from your computer and if it seems impossible, you can instead watch videos about positivity or movies that makes you happy, can reduce your stress and can make you feel better.

4. Do something else.

Keeping yourself busy while at home is also a way to cope up with stress and anxiety. When you’re alone you have a lot of time to do stuff that you love to do instead of worrying when will this Coronavirus will end and find more ways, how to overcome anxiety.  

You can write a story or an article, you can paint, you can cook and bake some cookies, you can learn new dance steps, you can watch your favorite movie over again, you can do productive activities like exercise and many more. There are actually a lot of things that you can do in such a short period of time and if you make it as a habit, it will help you discipline your life and will help you not think about anything useless.

5. Accept who you are.

We are all different in our own ways. We should stop comparing and focus on our best qualities.  Focus on the things where we are good at and learn to accept the yin and yang of ourselves, being contented in holding the good and not so good parts of our self. It is accepting the complete you, your flaws and imperfections and claiming that you are the best! Being confident and believing oneself without any shame, guilt or denial can make you mentally and physically healthy.

If you gained or lose weight this quarantine, it doesn’t matter as long as you are healthy. Looks are temporary anyway. Do you want to go through life always wishing you looked different? Or would you rather eagerly await the joys every age has in store for you? Seize every moment of your life and make the most out of it! 

It is important that you talk about what you feel and be honest about it. You should acknowledge your emotions and be open to talk about it with your parents, to a family member or with your friends. Plan as a team and work together how to reduce stress at home. By implementing good mental-health and well-being measures and by relying on others when necessary, we can protect ourselves and those around us.

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In an economy that is steadily depending on digital capabilities to survive, it is critical for any business to have its own online presence. E-commerce is rapidly becoming the norm for most businesses– from food to fast-moving consumer goods, fashion, groceries, appliances, services, and even real estate.

Currently, there are plenty of sites offering this critical business platform. Of all of them, the two most popular ones are WordPress and Shopify, and there is often the debate on which is better.

To begin, let us identify the two to better understand which one is which. Wikipedia defines Shopify as a proprietary e-commerce platform for online stores and retail point-of-sale systems, while WordPress is a free and open-source content management system (CMS) written in PHP and paired with a MySQL or MariaDB database.

Flexibility

WordPress, being an open-source platform, it is significantly more customizable than Shopify with plenty of features to satisfy even the most meticulous users. WordPress allows users to be more flexible with the website features and design through themes and custom plugins that other developers usually provide for free. Buying and using themes like Divi or Elementor further allows you to easily personalize every corner of your website.

Shopify also offers free and paid templates, although changing something as vital as your theme will also require you to make the corresponding reformatting of your content to follow the template’s structure. Should you need to add out-of-the-box functionality, you can still do so by checking the Shopify App Store for free or mostly paid addons.

Ease of Use

WordPress was originally made for blogging. It has evolved due to the demand because of the basic technical knowledge required. There are also plenty of online resources that users may tap to learn the platform on their own. It may be confusing at first but if you invest a couple of hours on tutorials, it’ll be like learning how to navigate on a newly released mobile device. 

Similarly, you also require learning time to use Shopify. This platform is really made for e-commerce and functions as SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) by its core. Its structure is designed to focus on adding products and selling them through the website which already included in the plan. If your focus is on selling and not designing your website, meaning you would just follow the free template provided and not do customization, you can easily set up your Shopify site in no time.

Ownership & Expansion

Using an open-source WordPress platform means you would need to have your own hosting service. This means you will have to pay for it separately, although this approach allows you to have full control over your web storage account. As a result, you can have multiple websites, host your own email, and all other things depending on the hosting plan you availed.

Unfortunately with Shopify, you can neither add more sites nor host email accounts with your domain name for personal use. But you can still use the Shopify Email addon for campaign ads and email marketing which is free until October 2020, after which you get 2,500 emails free each month and only pay USD 1 for every 1,000 emails you send after that. If you would need to use email for your team or customer engagement, you would need to get third-party email hosting services (G-Suite, Office365, Zoho Mail, etc) separately.

Shopify being a SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) in nature means that you don’t have full ownership of the platform. You would need to consider your long term plans for your business as this is one of the deciding factors. There are many platforms and websites back in the days that have long closed out taking their customers along with them. One good example is the shutdown of Multiply Marketplace in May 2013, which could also happen to other e-commerce or social media websites. If you have your website on WordPress, full control means you can always back up your full site, email, and database then download it on your personal storage for safekeeping. And since its open-source, you can easily move it to another hosting service provider using the same platform.

Cost & Transaction Fees

While WordPress doesn’t have its own tool or dashboard for e-commerce, most third-party e-commerce plug-ins are compatible and easy to integrate. For payment, you can use PayPal which charges around 4% transaction fee. Shopify, on the other hand, does not charge transaction fees if you use their Shopify Payment Gateway. Sadly, this is still not yet available in the Philippines as of this writing, therefore, Shopify will charge around 2.9% on top of your Paypal transaction fees for every successful sale. Do take note that there will be no charges if you set your payments to Cash-on-Delivery or manual bank transfers for both platforms. Although some banks in the country will charge a small fee for inter-bank transfers.

The Basic Shopify Account starts at USD 29 (PHP 1,465) per month which allows you to have up to 2 staff accounts to manage the store and website. While for WordPress, you can add many admin accounts at no cost. This is an advantage if you have a team that collaborates to do inventory, blog content writing, web design and etc.

For the hosting of WordPress, you can technically host your own site with a DIY server but its rather much more cost-efficient to subscribe to a cloud hosting plan nowadays. The price range would vary per service provider, however, with our DatastiQ Starter Plan for example, the price only starts at PHP 850 per month which includes free DIVI theme, free web design, and webmaster service. For a small one time charge, you can upgrade to get the e-Commerce add-on to have our team set up WooCommerce plug-in for you.

We are doing this to assist our local Filipino entrepreneurs creating their first digital footprint which in turn will help increase internet maturity in our country.

Unless you would know how to set up and build your Shopify website, you might somehow need to hire a Shopify web designer if you got stuck somewhere. This is usually on per hour basis which might cost you more on top of the other things that you are already paying for.

For the website name, both platforms would require domain name registration with the price varying depending on the TLD (Top Level Domain) you would choose (.com, .net, .ph, etc). If you want to know more about domain names, you can check out our Digital Uptraining video for an easy explanation.

Conclusion

DatastiQ recognizes that in e-commerce, user experience is critical and it all depends on how the website is designed. Even with superior products, a clunky and unfriendly user interface would invariably ruin sales. The objective is to create a smooth, painless transition from browsing to selection to payment.

If you can set up your shop website on your own and then focus on the selling part immediately without going for additional features or add-ons, like email hosting to interact and reply to your customers, then Shopify is more recommended for you. It’s a little bit expensive but it offers smooth templates, good inventory, email marketing, and sales reporting.

However, if this is your first time to go beyond the digital realm and you need someone to guide you, having your own web hosting and developer using WordPress would be ideal for your business especially if you plan to go further on the design, features, savings, ownership, and interoperability. With WordPress’ powerful customizability, the user experience is bound to be a pleasant one.

We believe that both platforms are like apples and oranges, both are designed to cater to the need of present businesses and online sellers. Each has unique features and in the end, it all boils down to your preferred taste. If ever you need a team to assist you on either Shopify or WordPress, you can always contact us for consultation, because together we will grow your business.

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Coronavirus disease 2019 or more commonly known as COVID-19 has been affecting all businesses globally and if you own or run a business, we believe you are somehow affected in one way or another.

In order to continue profit, you must make your operations resilient in times of crisis. Amidst the chaos and panic, we understand that business must go on, hence we have listed down some things to consider which might help you and your company in these times.

Educate Yourself and Your Team

First on the list to ensure you are on top of the situation. It is critical to understand and know what you are facing, as of this writing its COVID-19. Understand how this flu-like virus behaves, transfer and how it can be avoided. Ensure that you discuss and educate this with your staff and team. The more you equip yourselves with information, the more prepare your company could become. 

One quick tip, if you don’t want to read the medical journals and long research studies, you can always look for Frequently Ask Questions (FAQs) to save you some reading time. Start now and check out the World Health Organization’s Q&A for Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19).

Review Your Operational Structure

Once you know how COVID-19 works, begin to review your operational structure. Determine which are the core and critical staff from the support staff. Identify which functions and projects that can be pushed at the back burner. Review your deliverables and schedules to make sure you are ready in case your operation begins to flow roughly.

Things could get messy during a crisis scenario but knowing your chess pieces and how it works makes planning really easy and effective. Learn which team or staff can be moved and can provide support remotely. If they continue their normal operations while not in the office, then you are set to go.

Assess & Address Social-Emotional Concerns

There is a lot of information out there, sometimes it’s useful while most are not. And the last thing you want to happen is for your people to start panicking. Once your team starts to panic, it disables them to operate and think like in the regular days. The concerns grow in the middle of chaos, which is not addressed properly, could become an expensive liability.

To avoid this, you must practice good leadership and ensure to communicate with your staff, your team and everyone else within your company. Do not show that you are also afraid and lost during this pandemic incident, but instead, take this a chance to connect and inspire your team. Check for their and their family’s well being, and provide assurance that the business is here to provide support to the best it can. If you have followed our first step, you should then be alright.

Plan & Execute Your Resiliency Strategy

Always remember, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”. While you are still not affected and are not under disaster recovery mode, take this opportunity to plan your resiliency strategy. Take the following fundamentals to make your very first resiliency plan:

1. Identify your plan owner and participants.
2. List down all possible incidents that could impact you and your business.
3. For each incident, identify your approach and strategy on how to recover.
4. Map your people and their recovery strategy. (ie. Work from home or Relocate to another site)
5. Test or execute your plan.

There are no hard rules on the format and style as long as you know the fundamentals. However, keep in mind that there is also an in-depth standard for Crisis Management, Business Resiliency, and Disaster Recovery, although, for now, you can start with the above method.

Upgrade Your Situational Awareness

Having a plan and knowing about the virus is not enough, ensure that you also know the growing numbers. Know the case numbers for suspected, confirmed and cleared gives you a better overview of what’s happening out there. You use the math skills you have learned during school days to analyze ratios, probabilities, and projections which could help you make proper operational decisions.

You can check out the Philippines’ Department of Health COVID-19 Informational Page to know if the numbers on your location or your clients’ area. You can also check Sandra Tabinas’ Tableau Dashboard for COVID-19 Cases in Metro Manila which is also DOH data-driven. If you are looking for much more data on a global scale, you can check out the ESRI ArcGIS OpsDashboard for COVID-19 made and maintained by Johns Hopkins University (JHU), which one of the first to track this case since it started last December 2019.

Inform Your Vendors & Stakeholders

You have now made significant actions for your business and your team, but it doesn’t end there. It is also important to determine if you need to notify your vendors, clients, and stakeholders. Every decision you are about to make, whether you will close or operate in shorter office hours, you need to update your customers. Business is a relationship, and every relationship requires communication. If you are in a regulated industry, you are required to report some activities if you invoke your resiliency plans. Every great business has a great communication strategy whether it’s for marketing, sales promotions or even for this case, during a crisis.

Be Flexible & Prepare for Lessons Learned

The above steps are already solid and will help your business become more resilient, unfortunately, anything could happen during a crisis, therefore you must keep a flexible mindset. Always be ready and adapt to the changes as things could suddenly turn left. And of course, the same with your plan. It could also not go smoothly but always remember to list down your difficulties and take it as part of Lessons Learned for review once all the dust has settled.

It could be difficult sometimes, however, just imagine that every incident is like a journey, you may experience it again but never the same. At least when you are about to embark on a new one, you would know what to do next and will probably discover the opportunities that come along with it.

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When you’re an adult, the phrase “Work to live, not live to work” is easier said than done. Work appointments can get in the way of social gatherings. Job commitments can stop you from pursuing what you want like traveling, exploring, and learning new things. Trying to achieve a work-life balance can be tricky and challenging. Fortunately, with just 4 simple actions, you can save yourself from getting caught up with work and commitments that can wear you out. Here are four important tips to help you achieve work and life balance.

Learn to Say No

If you’re a “Yes” person, you probably know that saying yes to every request and every task can wear you down. Saying yes to every task can also get in the way of you doing the things that are healthy for your soul. 

If something is overwhelming, taxing, or if it’s a task that gets in the way of your opportunities to enjoy life, learn to say no. Politely decline an offer, or learn how to effectively compromise to set a deadline that won’t get in the way of important gatherings with family and friends. 

Learning to say no also allows you to focus on tasks that matter most – you can say goodbye to burning yourself out just to finish everything. 

Remind Yourself That You Don’t Need to Do Everything

In this age, everyone seems to want to be an achiever. Due to big goals, we feel like we just can’t afford to not do everything. When things go wrong, disappointment can come in the way of us truly feeling happy and at peace with our lives. When all we can think about are unmet expectations, it’s hard to appreciate the little things in life. 

Relax. Remind yourself that it’s okay if you can’t do everything all at once. Setting realistic expectations can save you from getting overwhelmed and dissatisfied. 

Don’t Procrastinate

One good thing to remember is this: procrastination is not self-care. We may feel that it’s okay to leave work for a while to spend 2 hours on Facebook. However, after procrastinating, we would always find ourselves swamped with work. Finishing your tasks on time and not spending hours on distractions can help us have more time to pursue things we really want. 

Set a Time for Things That Matter Most

Work shouldn’t occupy our calendar all year long. Set a time to do things that matter most – a break to spend time with family, leave to travel to your dream destination, and a day off for your favorite adventures. Going for things that matter to us can leave us more energized and ready for whatever comes at work. 

Don’t let work eat up your time. With these 4 work-life balance tips, you can live life to the fullest. 

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Most of our daily activities rely on the internet. Whether it’s for a cooking recipe for Adobo or a blueprint to conquer the world, there will definitely some guide out there posted on some website on the world wide web. But to start with, do we even know how those websites work?

If you are already surfing along the digital waves, you might already have an idea that each website is actually being stored and hosted somewhere. You might have also heard the term Cloud Web Hosting, but what does it really mean? Does it mean that whenever you browse the internet, your computer connects into a server that sits on top of the clouds?

To further understand it’s meaning, let’s look at the difference between Cloud and Traditional web hosting. Watch this video in Filipino-English to easily learn how it works.

For our example, your website files are stored in a server inside a data center in a different location. And then you and your customers or website visitors directly connect to it. This is called traditional or conventional web hosting.

And because there is only one source of data and connection, the server often slows and drops whenever there is a high volume of traffic.

Cloud Web Hosting, on the other hand, works differently. Instead of connecting directly, the main server makes a copy or cache of your web files and puts it on different remote servers also known as the Cloud Distribution Network (CDN).

When a user attempts to visit your website, the nearest server with a copy of your web files will host and provide the connection. Because of this, your customers’ transactions will be faster if your business uses cloud hosting.

In summary, below are the advantages of Cloud Web Hosting:

• Fast Connection and Performance
• Higher Uptime and availability
• Safe from Server Hardware issues and breakdowns
• Fast Provisioning and Propagation for updates and changes to your website.
• Customer Geolocation Friendly, no matter where your customer is.
• Security & Less Vulnerable to Hacking, as it passes through different servers for the connection.

If you are still under the traditional web hosting, we encourage you to switch to a cloud hosting plan that fits your needs to enjoy the advantages above. 

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